By Trina A. San Agustin
Variety News Staff

TWO Guam Police Department officers face separate charges in connection with various criminal charges including assault, child abuse and negligent entrustment of a firearm to a minor as the community observes Police Week.
Police Officer Raymond C. Benavente, 47, of the Agana Precinct, was arrested and charged with family violence, terrorizing, reckless conduct, criminal mischief, assault, and possession of a deadly weapon.
Benavente, of Dededo, was booked and confined.
His girlfriend, Doris Santos Taijeron, 45, Dededo, was also arrested and charged with family violence, assault, and child abuse. She was also booked and confined.
GPD public information officer Allan Guzman said Dededo Precinct officers responded to a domestic report in Dededo this past weekend.
Guzman told Variety that the domestic argument at the residence began Friday night and continued into Saturday and that other family members got involved.
Taijeron allegedly assaulter her 12-year-old daughter and when Taijeron’s 25-year-old son intervened, Benavente allegedly pointed his GPD-issued firearm at family members, according to Guzman.
Meanwhile, a Superior Court grand jury indictment reveals numerous charges that GPD Sgt. Kenneth J.Q. Castro is facing from a 2006 shooting.
Castro, 40, is assigned to the Special Operations Command division of GPD which includes Special Weapons and Tactics, or SWAT, Executive Security, and Marine Patrol.
The indictment charges Castro with unlawful transfer without a firearms identification as a felony, negligent entrustment of a firearm to a minor as a third-degree felony, four counts of child abuse as a third-degree felony, hindering apprehension as a misdemeanor, making a false report as a misdemeanor, four counts of reckless conduct as a misdemeanor, and obstructing governmental functions as a misdemeanor.
Castro has an arraignment hearing on June 6 at 10 a.m. in front of Superior Court Judge Alberto Lamorena, according to the Attorney General’s Office.
The indictment states that in May 2006, Castro allowed a 13-year-old to possess a 12-gauge shotgun.
Additionally, he was charged with four counts of child abuse as he had four male minors, two 11-year-olds and two 13-year-olds, in his custody at the time the firearm was transferred.
One of the 11-year-olds was wounded in the foot by another minor in the group using the 12-gauge shotgun that Castro allegedly gave the minors.
Castro and the four minors, according to the indictment, made a false report to GPD allegedly at Castro’s instruction.
In 2006, then Police Chief and now Sen. Frank Ishizaki informed the media that the investigation conducted by GPD’s Internal Affairs Division showed that the gun was accidentally fired, wounding the 11-year-old.